Eleanor, Just Shut Up Already

Via Blackfive

The military doesn’t like to get involved in humanitarian missions, and needed prodding ... The administration disdains the soft, touchy-feely stuff of diplomacy and foreign aid.

Oh really? Well let me tell you a little story about how I was “prodded” into a humanitarian mission. In the summer of ’97 I had recently reported to SEAL Team ONE after completing the year long Independent Duty Corpsman School at Naval Medical Center, San Diego. I received orders to go to Pattaya, Thailand for Cobra Gold, a month long military exercise that is conducted with the Thai Armed Forces every 2 years. Cobra Gold is considered a “good deal for good SEALs” trip and I looked forward to going except for one problem. I had already committed to going to Kenya with the 5th Special Forces Group to serve on Medical Civic Action Program (MEDCAP) mission just days after I was scheduled to return from Thailand. As usual, the return flight was late, and during our refueling stop in Hawaii, one of the sailors coming back with us became violently ill. The sailor was taken to Tripler Army Hospital for treatment, and I was asked to accompany him and see to it that he was taken care of. The flight had to leave for San Diego without me and I had nothing with me but the clothes on my back. After squaring away this sailor, I had to arrange last minute commercial air transport to San Diego and I arrived in California the morning before I was to travel to Ft. Campbell, KY for the Kenya trip.

I spent the entire day packing and preparing for the MEDCAP, and had to show up at the Team area at 0 dark 30 to check out weapons and scramble to Lindbergh Field in San Diego for the flight to Knoxville, TN. I was traveling with a fellow SEAL IDC I’ll call MR and when we got to the airport, with a 100+lb. cruise box full of our stuff, a weapons box, and some kit bags we were informed that the cruise box was too heavy for union baggage handlers to carry (limit 40lbs.). We were told that we had to load it as cargo at a different terminal, so we checked in the weapons box and kit bags at the desk, and off we went to find transportation to the cargo terminal. The airport shuttle refused to let us onboard with the cruise box, so we ended up lugging it and our carry on bags 1/2 mile away to load it up.

Then we ran back to the main terminal because we were going to be late for the flight. While going through security, MR realized in horror that he had his personal pistol in his carry on bag and reported it to the security personnel. He was yanked off of the flight, and I had to continue on without him because we had already checked two M-4 automatic rifles and two Mk-23 .45 pistols onto the flight. We figured that the Team wouldn’t be pleased if those weapons showed up in Knoxville without someone there to claim them. When I arrived in Knoxville, I expected a couple of SF guys to be waiting there with a van to take me to the base, but I was sorely mistaken. I then had to rent two Smarte Cartes and haul the cruise box, the weapons box, and several kit bags through the airport and find alternate transportation to Ft. Campbell. After riding a couple hours in a base shuttle van with all of this gear, I arrived at 5th Group at 7pm. I hadn’t been able to reach MR all day, and for all I knew he was rotting in jail in San Diego. The flight to Kenya was scheduled to leave at 5am the next morning and I found a couch to crash on until then. MR showed up at 10pm with a case of beer, so we just drank until whenever, and got on the plane the next morning at 0 dark 30.

The flight to Kenya was a chartered 757 packed to the gills, and we rode on that plane for 24 hours stopping in Ireland, Cairo, and Djibouti before arriving in Nairobi. MR and I each took 3 Ambien pills and didn’t remember the flight, but we did get some pictures later of SF guys licking my face and jamming stuff in my nostrils while I was unconscious. So at least I had that going for me.

We spent a few days in Nairobi on cots in an aircraft hangar while the Army rented a bunch of trucks for us for the trip North to the Somalian border. We drove countless hours on “roads” that were about as bumpy as they were desolate until we reached the Sumburu Province where the Army set up a tent city. The majority of the SF guys were there to train the Kenyan Army, and a static line parachute jump was scheduled for the next day. When we got on the C-130, the Air Force flight crew made us feel at home once they found out that some Navy SEALs were on the jump. The pilots flew nap of the earth for an hour, weaving and bobbing along trying to make the SEALs puke. MR and I DID NOT VOMIT! But the Army surgeon with us and one of the AF aircrew guys did (I have pictures!). After earning our Kenyan Jump Wings, we proceeded further North to the first site where the MEDCAP would commence.

We drove in a convoy of Toyota Land Cruisers and trucks filled with medical supplies on seemingly impassable roads for 24 hours through an area riddled with bandits and various scumbags who were looking for vehicles to hijack. This journey took us through the heart of Africa for the better part of a month to various places where we would set up a medical clinic and treat the populace and their livestock for various diseases. We slept outside under the stars every night on cots with mosquito nets and woke up with the sun every morning.

Besides myself and MR, there were several SF medics, an Army surgeon, an Army Vet, some Kenyan medical and veterinary people, our Kenyan truck drivers, and an A-Team for our security. Each day we would switch between medical and veterinary duties. On medical day, I would see patients from sunrise to sunset with a Kenyan guy translating for me; from time to time I would consult with the surgeon on diagnosis and treatment, but not very often. During the MEDCAP, I caught several potentially fatal cases of Falciparum malaria in very young children whose lives were undoubtedly saved by our intervention. I saw something like 60 patients per day, and we treated hundreds of nomadic tribespeople for every condition in the Tropical Disease Handbook.

On vet day, we would vaccinate dozens of heads of cattle, castrate donkeys, and generally treat whatever veterinary issues that came up. I even performed surgery on a 2000lb. bull to remove a 50lb. penile tumor, but that’s a whole other story.

During our travels, members of our party were attacked by bandits with AK-47s, and the Colonel pulled us out of the field and back to the base camp. On the way back, one of the Land Cruisers broke the left front leaf spring on the rough terrain 24 hours away from camp. MR had the idea to take the winch on the front bumper and attach it to the axle and pull it into line. That vehicle amazingly made it back to camp, and we had a garage in Sumburu put a new one on before we turned it over to the rental company in Nairobi. I could probably write a book about our adventures on this trip, and someday maybe I will.

It was the greatest thing I ever did in the Navy, and I wasn’t prodded into it by anyone.